PIECES OF SILVER
has long puzzled over
their relative buying
power.*
In ancient days the
location of the mines
and the presence or
lack of transport often
affected the ratio.
By the code of
Menes the ratio in
Egypt was fixed at two
and a half silver to one
of gold. On the other
hand, in the early his
tory of Arabia, silver
was worth ten times as
much as gold, because
of meager communica
tions with lands that
had more silver than
Arabia.
As early as 708
B. C., however, an al
most modern ratio was
reached in the Tigris
Valley. On cuneiform
tablets dug up at Nine
veh the rate was fixed
at about 133 to 1.
From the time of
the Caesars down to the
discovery of America,
gold was worth about
twelve times as much
as silver. Even after
all the new gold and
silver mines were
opened in America, the
From a coi
ratio stuck a r o u n d cleverly that
14:1and16:1until tinybottom.
about 1870, because
so many lands used silver as n
When the gold-standard idea spread,
crashed; by 1902 one ounce of gold
buy about 39 ounces of silver.
In the World War, however, silve
again. By 1919 it was $1.37 an
This led still more countries to sell
silver and shift to the gold standard
silver started down again. On Dec
29, 1932, it sold at only 242 cen
ounce; then it took 84 ounces of sil
buy one of gold-the cheapest pri
silver ever known.
* See "Men and Gold," by Frederick Simi
the NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE for
1933.
TRY THIS WITH YOUR TACK HAMMER!
n one of Gorham's gifted silversmiths made this miniature so
the words "one dime" remain unchanged on the pitcher's
loney.
Causes both economic and political
silver brought about the fall of silver. One cause
would was that many nations reduced their use
of subsidiary silver coins, while still other
r rose
silver-standard countries tried to shift to
ounce.
gold.
their
, and
USE OF SILVER IN THE FAR EAST
ember
There was a high production of gold,
its an compared with silver, just before most of
ver to the world adopted the gold standard. Yet
:e for for nearly three centuries before silver's
recent acrobatic feats its price, in terms of
ich, in gold, had kept fairly steady.
April,
The East has long been called the sink
hole of silver. Although India, since 1926,
271